BETHEL — “My husband has a full-time job. I have a full-time job and in two weeks, my son is not going to have anywhere to go,” said parent, Kate Morin. “It really is a loss for the community … I’m sad about the daycare closing because the people that live here don’t have options.”
The Bethel Early Learning Center on Cross Street in the back of the Gem Theatre building, serves 19 families, with children ranging in age from six months to 4. They will close on February 24, confirmed owner, Jefrae Alford.
According to Morin, the imminent shut down of Bethel’s only daycare center is a systemic issue. “the grants the governor has created exist to set up a new daycare. They don’t exist for sustaining daycares…. [Additionally,] Oxford county is not one of the counties they are focusing on.”
Owner, Alford said she had trouble keeping up with payroll and with skyrocketing food costs. Groceries for children’s meals per week, “used to be $125-$130 It’s over $210, $220. Electricity went up, propane went up. Everything’s gone up. The only thing that hasn’t gone up is my rent. I was paying $1,900 10 years ago and he (Wade Cavanaugh) just increased it to $1960.”
“For the last year, financially it has been just horrible. Scratching to get by. For the last four months I put $5,000 each month of my own money into it and I decided I’m not doing this anymore. That’s retirement money,” said the 81 year old.
“I met with the parents two months ago and told them I had to increase the tuition and I’m sorry I had to increase it again and that if things weren’t going to get better I would have to close,” said Alford who was charging $40 in June of 2022 but by this January was charging $55 per child, per day.
“She had to keep increasing the prices,” said Morin who used her background in finance to help Alford set up an Excel file. “When you take off payroll, payroll taxes, rent, electric, propane, telephone bill, yes they would get food assistance. But the cost of overhead to maintain a daycare facility is so expensive, you can’t succeed.”
Morin looked into turning the day care into a non-profit by setting up a 501C, but the cost would be $2,500 for legal fees alone. Other parents have looked into keeping it going, too, she said.
She contacted 12 daycares from Bethel to Otisfield, “all of them were not taking more kids, many of them had a waitlist until the fall.” She said the owner of a Norway facility told her she has parents who as soon as they find out they are pregnant they get on her wait-list.
Alford’s eight employees may opt to take up to two children each in their own homes. More than two children and the state of Maine requires a license.
“Everyone is splitting up and they are finding a single parent or another person that can watch their kids. These kids that have been exposed to all of their friends are now just basically going to daytime babysitters with one other child. They are not getting that stimulation of multiple children. they are not learning sharing.”
It’s sad. We have built friendships with the parents. We’ve built relationships that are going to dwindle,” said Morin.
Alford had taught children at the Cross Street location for 13 years. For three years before that her business was on Spring Street and her first year in business, she worked from her home.
She delayed closing because she, “was worried about the parents and where the kids were going to go. There’s no other place in town. And there is no place with openings within 30 miles of here.”
In mid-March she’ll have an indoor yard sale. She is selling everything: a washer and dryer, a stove, wooden shelving, toys, two refrigerators, and vacuum cleaners.
Owners of other child care centers will get first dibs, she said.
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